Second Chances
by ThePendragonQueen
Summary: Leo's gone. He left the camp and left nothing behind. Nothing but his friends who refuse to let him go. Piper sets off to find him. Can she find him and will she be able to convince him to come back to camp? To give her a second chance? Songfic. Based on the song Second Chances by Imagine Dragons. Oneshot. Kinda sequel to I'm a Lone Red Rover.


**Hey so this is kinda like a Sequel to I'm a Lone Red Rover but you don't have to read that to fully understand what's going on but I would probably recommend? It's a oneshot but its kinda long for a oneshot. Anyways, this is based on the song Second Chances by Imagine Dragons so yes this is a songfic and it is a oneshot. And in this there is no Calypso, Leo never met her. I hope you enjoy, please follow, like, review, whatever you want to do. Comments on the story is very much appreciated. Thanks!**

 **Disclaimer: I own like absolutely nothing**

* * *

 **Pipers's POV:**

"Hey have you seen Leo?" I asked Jason popping my head into his cabin.

"No and I really need to find him, my swords all bent," he answered with an annoyed face.

"Yeah I can't find him any where," I said frowning. "Can you help me look?"

Jason nodded and got up from his bed. "Yeah, sure." He walked over to me and gave me a kiss before grabbing my hand and heading off.

The first place we checked was his cabin.

I nocked on the door before warily entering. It was the Hephaestus cabin after all, you never know what they might have tricked up at the door, they where almost as bad as the Hermes and Ares cabin. I walked in and saw Nysa grabbing some tools from her bed. "Hey Nysa," I said smiling at her.

She looked back at me, surprised to see me. "Oh, hey Piper, what's up?" She asked with slight concern on her face.

"Nothing, just wondering if you've seen Leo."

Nysa thought for a second before shaking her head. "No, I haven't seen him in a coupe days. I figured he was in Bunker 9 working on some project. Why? Do you need something done?"

"Actually, I need my sword fixed," Jason butted in. I nudged him in the side. Now was not the time, we were trying to find Leo.

Nysa shrugged. "I can do that for you if you want."

"Yeah, that'd be great. I'll just go get it now-"

"Jason," I cut off sternly looking at him.

"Sorry," Jason mumbled.

I looked back at Nysa with a polite smile. "No _I_ don't need anything done, I was just looking for him. I was going to ask him a question but now I don't even remember what it was I'm just concerned with finding him."

Nysa nodded in understanding. "Well, I was just now on my way to go to the Bunker to work on some stuff so you're welcomed to come with me to see if he's there. And Jason, bring your sword, I'll fix it up for you." We nodded and quickly stopped by Jason's cabin to grab his sword before heading off into the woods. "Oh yeah, you did mess this up pretty bad. Gods, how'd you do this?" Nysa asked Jason examining his sword.

Jason blushed a little and fixed his glasses looking slightly embarrassed. "I was practicing with Percy," he mumbled.

Nysa laughed a little. "Looks like he got the best of you," she teased with a smile.

I laughed a little and gave Jason a peck on the cheek for encouragement. "Don't worry you're still a great fighter." Jason seemed a little more at ease with those words but he was still slightly flushed. We reached the Bunker and walked inside to see a couple of Hephaestus children working on some machines.

"You guys are welcomed to look around, I'm going to go fix Jason's sword," Nysa said before walking away to the other side of the Bunker. We nodded and began to slowly weave our way through the crowded mess. We tried our best to look around for him but it was nearly impossible without stepping on a nail or nocking something over. I decided it would be easier to just ask someone so we walked up to a boy of about 17 hammering a piece of scrap metal.

"Um, hi, excuse me?" I said trying to grab the boys attention but it was hard to hear anything over the noise. "Excuse me," I said again a little louder but he still didn't hear me. "Stop!" I shouted getting annoyed. The boy froze in place and a couple people around me stopped what they were doing too. "Can I ask you a quick question please?" I asked the boy.

He slowly looked up at means put his hammer down. "Yeah, sure," he agreed a little concerned.

"Is Leo here?" I asked him.

He looked around the room a little before shaking his head and answering. "Nope, doesn't look like it."

"Well, have you seen him recently?" I asked him.

"Can't say I have."

"Do you know where he is?"

The boy shook his head. "Nope, sorry."

"Do you know _anything?_ " I asked getting very annoyed.

"Piper," Jason said trying to warn me to calm down.

"Uhh, I know you're kinda freaking me out right now. Why don't you go ask couple other people, I'm sure someone's seen him recently," The boy said before going back to hammering his sheet quite violently. I sighed and moved on to the next person. It was a girl about 14, I've talked to her a couple times before but nothing major, just enough to know her name.

"Hey, Jess, have you seen Leo recently?"

Jess looked up at me and shook her head. "No, sorry."

"When was the last time you saw him?" I questioned her.

She thought for a minute before answering. "A little over a week ago maybe? I don't know, I don't talk to him that much."

"Okay, thank you," I said and moved on to another girl of about 15 with curly hair named Sarah. "Hey, Sarah, have you seen Leo?"

"No," she answered without looking up from her project. She seemed to be attaching some kind of device to a sword.

"When was the last time you saw him?"

"Dunno," she answered dryly still not looking up.

"Do you know if anybody has seen him recently?" I asked her trying to get more information out of her.

She sighed while trying to screw something on, her concentration unwavering. "Look, I don't mean to be rude but I'm kind of busy right now."

I nodded. "Sorry," I said walking away onto the next person. The next person said the same thing- haven't seen him in a while. Then we asked someone else- same answer. We went on and asked the last couple people in the bunker and none of them could give me a specific date of the last time they saw Leo. I was getting annoyed but I guess in all fairness I couldn't give a specific day either. We were about to walk out the door and search somewhere else when Harley came running into the Bunker.

"Whoa there," Jason said just barely avoiding the little boy from running into him.

"Sorry!" Harley shouted running on.

"Harley, wait! Can you come here a second, please?" I yelled after him.

He stopped and turned towards me. "Sure," he said with his cute toothless, eight year old smile.

"Have you seen Leo?" I asked him as he walked closer to me. He shook his head. "When was the last time you saw him?"

"I saw him on Thursday get out of his bed late at night. I thought he was coming to here but I didn't see him the next day when I came in. I thought he was just busy doing something and I was just missing him. He's always very busy," he said nodding.

I swallowed before going on. Something felt very wrong. "Harley," I said carefully, "What was he wearing when he left the cabin?"

Harley squinted as he remembered. "Just normal clothes."

"And was he holding anything special? Like a machine or item?" I asked him trying to keep my voice calm but I was starting to get very worried.

"No," Harley said shaking his head. "He was just wearing normal clothes and a backpack."

"Wait- a backpack?" I asked quickly. He hadn't said anything about a backpack before.

Harley nodded. "Yeah he had his tool belt and a backpack on."

My heart sunk. I stood up straight and gripped Jason's wrist. "We need to go. _Now_."

Jason looked at me with alarm trying to figure out what I was thinking. "What why-"

"Just trust me," I said giving him a hard look. Jason nodded.

"W-what's wrong? Is Leo okay?" Harley asked, tears brimming in his eyes.

"Yes, Leo's fine," I lied not wanting to scare the little boy. "Thank you for your help, Harley." I said giving him a tight hug.

I pulled away and started walking towards the door. "Find Leo please," Harley said standing there playing with the end of his shirt nervously.

I gave him a confident smile. "Don't worry, we will, it'll be okay," I said and then walked out of the Bunker.

As soon as the door closed I almost started crying. "Pipes, are you okay? Why are you so upset?" Jason asked trying to give me a hug but I was too busy pacing back and forth and running my hands through my hair in frustration.

"Because, Jason, how could we let this happen?"

"Let what happen?"

"Leo, he's- he's gone."

Jason stared at me perplexed. "What do you mean he's gone? How do you know?"

"Because Harley said he saw him leaving the cabin late at night dressed in normal clothes with a backpack on! Do you not remember? We caught Leo trying to leave one night at Fort Wilderness and he was dressed exactly like that. With a book bag on and everything. Oh my Gods, how could we do this? How could we let this happen?" I practically yelled with tears starting to make their way down my face. "We- we need to tell Chiron. We need to go look for him."

"Okay we will, you just need to calm down, it'll be fine, we'll find Leo." Jason said trying to calm me down but he looked a little worried himself.

We walked back to the main area and Jason had to stop me from running over there. Since I couldn't do that I started mumbling angrily about the whole situation. "Thursday, Jason, Thursday. The last time anyone saw Leo was Thursday night. Do you know what day it is? Tuesday! It's Tuesday! It's been almost a week! Leo was gone for a week and _nobody_ noticed! How could we do this?"

Jason ran his hand through his hair nervously and sighed. "I know I feel guilty about it too but right now we just need to worry about finding him."

I nodded and heard a horn from the distance, the signal for dinner. I sped up my pace a little and found Chiron standing to the side watching over all the campers. "Chiron?" I asked politely trying to get his attention.

Chiron looked over at me with eyes that had lived a thousand lives. "Ah, hello Piper," he said nodding his head a little. "What can I do for you?"

"It's Leo. I think he left." I said frantically as Jason finally caught back up to me and stood at my side.

"Left?" Chiron puzzled trying to understand what I was saying. "As in left the camp?"

"Yes, he ran away. Please, Chiron, we have to find him," I pleaded.

Chiron nodded sternly and looked back out at the campers eating and loudly hit his hoof against the floor. Everyone stopped and turned to look up at him in curiosity. "Could I please see the seven in the Big House?" he asked loudly. He then turned around to look back at me and Jason. "Come, we'll talk about this inside."

We walked in and sat down around the table, I fidgeting widely and Jason brushing his hand through his hair and adjusting his glasses constantly while thinking. Chiron folded himself into his magical wheelchair and rolled up to the side. I heard the door creak open and watched Percy, Annabeth, Hazel, and Frank walk in looking slightly concerned. I silently prayed that Leo would come walking in behind them but I wasn't that lucky. "What's happening? Do not tell me that the Gods want us to go on another quest because I don't care who's trying to take over the world, I refuse to." Percy said pulling out a chair and sitting down.

"No that's not why I've called you here," Chiron said looking around at everyone as they sat down. "Is this everyone?" he asked counting quickly.

Hazel looked around the room too. "No we're still missing Leo," she stated and my heart broke because in a couple of seconds the terrible new would be broken to her and I knew Hazel would be upset at the loss of her friend.

Chiron looked down grimly. "Actually, that is what I've called you here to talk about."

Hazel looked up startled. "About Leo? What about him? Is he okay?"

Chiron looked over at me. "Do you mind telling them?"

I nodded. "I went to look for Leo today but I couldn't find him in his cabin so I went out and looked in Bunker 9 and nobody knew where he was or admitted to not seeing him for a couple days. I was about to give up when I ran into Harley, he was the only one able to give me a straight answer. He said the last time he had seen Leo had been Thursday night leaving Cabin 9. He was dressed up in normal clothes with his tool belt and a backpack."

Frank looked at me confused. "Okay so where is he?"

"He left." Annabeth stated understanding my story. I nodded grimly.

"Wait, you mean he like, ran away?" Percy asked. I nodded again. "But... why?"

Jason spoke this time because I couldn't. "This isn't the first time he's ran away. He had run away a couple times before from foster homes and lived on the streets and me and Piper had once caught him trying to leave when we were at Wilderness School. I just never thought he would do it again..." his voice trailed off.

"But why did he?" Frank asked looking puzzled.

Annabeth made a sour face. "Well, judging by how long it took one of us to notice he was even gone, I'm going to assume it was because of us. Because we've been ignoring him for so long. I include myself in that statement by the way."

Hazel shook her head. "But we didn't ignore him on purpose!" she defended.

"Yeah, but he doesn't know that. Think about it, how would you feel if all of your friends just started ignoring you and not having time or you? Accidentally or not, it sucks. We should've payed him more attention." Annabeth stated back. She was mostly speaking with her mind but you could hear some heart leaking threw.

Everyone got quiet with guilt. We knew Annabeth was telling the truth even though it was a truth hard to come to terms with. It was hard to believe that you could unintentionally be such a bad friend and make your friend run away. It was a truth that stung but, nonetheless the truth. I sighed and softly spoke. "we just... we _have_ to find him..."

Jason rubbed my back supportively and Chiron spoke up. "I think it would be wise if you guys went out looking for him tomorrow morning. Go in pairs and try to cover as much area as possible."

"Tomorrow? Why can't we leave now?" I asked impatiently.

"Because it's too dark. If you leave now it'll be harder to find him and you'll have more chances of being attacked. It's just not safe. You will have to wait to leave tomorrow." Chiron explained calmly. I wanted to protest more but I knew he was right. We all nodded solemnly and went off to eat whatever little dinner we could manage to get down. That night it took my hours before I could go to sleep. I kept tossing and turning, my mind didn't stop thinking and my stomach was unsettled by guilt with the little food I had eaten that night. The only thing running through my head were my thoughts telling me how awful of a friend I was and how I let this happen, how it could've been prevented just by me paying attention to Leo like I should have. I shouldn't have left him alone and cast him off to the side like that. I prayed to all the Gods that he was still alive and okay.

* * *

That morning I awoke at the crack of dawn and immediately got dressed to look for Leo. I knocked on Jason's door to make sure he was awake then went out and tried to eat as much breakfast as I could but the nervousness was making my stomach turn. Eventually the other five came to join me at the table, some where able to eat more than me. I sat agitated, moving my leg. I wanted to hurry up and leave, hurry up and find Leo and hug him and apologize to him. I blamed myself for him running away and I was right to. Of course, it wasn't just my fault, everyone else had ignored him too, but I was his oldest and closest friend, I of all people should have been paying attention to him.

"Can we please go already?" I asked impatiently.

Jason looked at me with a full mouth. "Piper, we just sat down to eat."

"I know but I've been sitting here for 20 minutes now and I really want to get a move on," I pleaded with Jason who sighed.

"Fine, we can leave now," he said exasperated and picked up an apple to take with him. "Do we have everything we need?"

"Yeah, I packed an extra pair of clothes and some food and money just in case, hopefully we won't be out looking for him for that long though." I shouldered my book bag and got up from the table.

Percy swallowed a bite of his waffle and looked up at everyone. "How do we know where to look?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "We don't. We'll just have to split up. Me and Jason will go that way through the woods, Percy, you and Annabeth can go towards the highway over there and Frank and Hazel, you guys go the opposite direction of them." They all nodded and Jason got up to join me in the walk through the forest.

As we walked I nervously tapped my fingers on my waist. Jason seemed to notice it. "Hey, don't worry we will find him I promise," he assured putting his arm around me and pulling me close. I bit my lip nervously. I wasn't really sure we were going to. "So, what's your plan?" he asked me.

"I figured we would ask around and try to trace his steps until we find him. It might take a while but it's really the only thing we can do." Jason nodded and we continued walking in silent nervousness. After a couple minutes Jason spoke up again.

"Hey, let's try to take our minds off of this a little. I was thinking, what if we go to New Rome for college? We could get a small apartment, live together," Jason said grabbing my hand and shooting me a smile. I knew he was trying to cheer me up but it wasn't really helping.

I sighed. "Look, I know you don't mean this in a bad way and you're just trying to help but I really don't want to talk about the future right now because honestly, right now I'm afraid we're going to have a future without Leo Valdez and I really don't want that." Jason nodded knowingly and we left it at that. We finally reached the edge of the forest and found the road. "You think we should cross it?"

Jason shrugged. "Maybe. I'm not really sure which way Leo would go."

I thought for a minute. "Well, where's the nearest city from here?"

"That way," Jason said pointing across the road.

"Well, then that way it is." We walked across the street that had no cars on it and continued walking towards the nearest city area. After a while we finally made it to some small alleyways on the outskirts of town. I scanned the area thinking. "I know Leo and I know that when he ran away before from foster homes he lived in the streets and sometimes in the sewers," I thought out loud.

"You think he's here?" Jason asked me.

"Maybe not now but at one point he might have been. He probably kept going though, trying to distance himself from the camp as much as possible."

"Well, he left almost a week ago so he had some time to distance himself," Jason pointed out. My heart dropped as I realized he was right. We were never going to find Leo. He was days ahead of us and we didn't even have a track to follow. "Maybe we should ask around, see if anyone has seen him," Jason suggested. I nodded and we walked on looking for anyone who might be a regular in this part of town.

I looked over and saw a man dumping some trash into the dumpster in the back of his store. "Let's ask him," I said and started jogging towards him. "Sir, sir!" I yelled trying to grab his attention. The man looked up at me with dark brown eyes and wild hair. "Hi, I was wondering if you've seen a boy about my age, curly, dark hair and brown eyes, hispanic, a little taller than me?"

The man furrowed his eyebrows and grunted. "Yeah, I saw him. He tried to steal some tissues from my shop," he complained in a heavy New York accent.

"Tissues? Why was he stealing tissues?" I asked confused.

The man gave a disinterested shrug. "Dunno, he seemed kinda sick but I'm glad I caught him. He was lucky I didn't call the police on him," the man spat.

Sick? Leo was sick? And running around on his own? Now we really needed to find him. "Do you know which way he went?"

"That way I think," the man said pointing out towards the main part of the city.

I smiled at him gratefully and thanked him many times. "Thank you so much, sir."

"Yeah, whatever, just make sure he doesn't come back around here and try to steal something again!" he shouted annoyed and walked back inside his shop. Me and Jason walked along the sidewalk to the main part of the city.

We walked through crowded streets and sidewalks trying to avoid being ran into. "There's absolutely no way Leo is here. It's too busy. He likes the small streets where there's no one around," I said starting to get a little frustrated.

"Okay, we'll just have to keep walking across town until we find the smaller streets where he could be," Jason assured me. I nodded and we kept walking. I looked up at the sky. The sun was starting to make its way down. It had to be at least two o'clock now. We had been looking for almost five hours and I was starting to get frustrated. He seemed to be nowhere in sight. Nobody in the city had heard or seen him and I was starting to get antsy.

I felt my stomach rumble and I think I heard Jason's do the same. "Maybe we should stop for a little. Relax, eat," he offered.

I shook my head. My feet were killing me but we had to find Leo. "We have some food in our bags, we can eat while we walk and look for Leo."

"C'mon, Pipes, just for a second."

"No, that's wasted time that we could be using to find Leo," I said shortly.

Jason sighed and nodded. He knew better than to agree with me right now. We pulled out some sandwiches we had packed and ate while searching the many streets. We had just finished our sandwiches and still no Leo. It had to be almost three now.

"Pipes, you know, we're gunna have to find somewhere to stay overnight," Jason pointed out as nicely as possible.

"We'll thin about that later, okay? When the time comes. We still have a couple hours 'till sun down."

Jason sighed. "Okay." I watched as Jason veered slightly off the road and down a smaller street to a big dumpster to throw away our sandwich wrappers. Jason lifted up the lid and held it open while I threw the stuff away. As Jason shut the lid with a loud bang my thoughts veered off. What if we can''t find Leo? What if something happened to him? What if there was a monster? The man from the store had said he looked sick right? What if it got worse? My mind reeled with what if questions. They were cut short by a large sneeze. I looked up abruptly at Jason and gave him a questioning look as if asking, _Was that you?_ Jason shook his heard slightly. There was another sneeze. We spun our heads around trying to find the source. Another one. This time I found where it was coming from. I looked closely to a dark corner by the side of the building, trying to make out the figure. Was that...

"Leo?" I asked in a small voice. I watched as the head of the figure seemed to look up at us. "Leo?" I asked again walking towards the figure, my voice hoarse. The figure stood up but stayed in the shadowy area. I started walking faster towards it. It was stupid of me. It easily could have been a random person or a robber or a monster in disguise yet I kept walking towards it. It had to be Leo, it _had_ to be. "Leo, it's me. Please, Leo."

The shadowy figure slowly stepped out shielding their eyes from the bright sun. "Piper?" it asked in an unbelieving tone. The figure walked out just enough for me to see curly black hair dancing all around in a big mess.

"Leo!" I shouted running forward. I wrapped him in a big hug. I never wanted to let go.

"Piper... Piper- please," he said with a strained voice.

"Oh, sorry," I said backing away from him but never taking my hands off his arms. I pulled him into the sunlight more so that I could see his face. He had large bags under his eyes, his skin was paler, his eyes bloodshot, and his forehead damp. "Leo, what happened to you? Are you okay? You look terrible," I said pressing the back of my hand to his forehead to feel his temperature. He was burning hot, even for his standards.

"Yes, Piper, I'm fi-" his answer was cut off by a sneeze.

"Oh my Gods, Leo, you're sick. You need to come back so you can get better," I said grabbing his arm and leading him forward to Jason who was still standing back by the dumpster. I assumed he thought it would be best if I felt with him first rather then being bombarded with two different people asking him questions.

I started dragging Leo away but he stopped and jerked on his arm causing me to stop and turn to look at him. "Back? You want me to got back there? After you all ignored me? I'm not going back there!" Leo shouted angrily but it sounded nasally from his nose being all stuffy.

I looked back at him shocked. "But... you have to come back," I muttered just barely above a whisper.

"And why should I? Huh? You guys don't care about me! You all ignore me all the time, everyone of you! I always tried to talk to you guys, always tried to hang out with you guys, but you never wanted to. You always claim that you're "too busy". The only time you ever talked to me was when you needed something done, when I had to fix something of yours. Other than that, I was nothing but paint on a wall, dirt on the ground. You ignored me. All the time. Why should I go back? So I can go back to being unloved? Unwanted? Used? There's nothing there for me. Nobody wants me around, you make it obvious. I mean, just look how long it took you to find me. A week! And how long did it take you to notice I was gone, huh? 5 days? 6? Probably something like that. You guys don't care about me so why the hell should I go back to that camp?" Leo yelled angrily at me.

I was silent for a while. I didn't know what to say. Leo was right, we had all been pushing him off to the side, telling him we were too busy to hang out, only talking to him when we needed something. And it had taken us almost a week to even realize he ad left. He deserved friends way better than us. And we didn't deserve him at all. He was a good, honest friend who always stuck by your side and we took him for granted and I will always hate myself for it. I was wrong for what I did and I admitted that, but now I wanted him back. I _needed_ him back. I need the jokester back into my life to brighten up my day and make me laugh. I needed my little brother to talk to and hang out with, to tall secrets and have deep conversations with. I needed _Leo._

"Leo, please. I need you. I know what I did was wrong. I should have never ignored you. I should have never taken you for granted. Leo, you are my best friend and I love you more than anything. I messed up bad before and I know it'll be hard to forgive and make it up to you but please let me try. I know you've been through a lot in your life and I know that you think you should run away again and that you shouldn't trust me anymore but please, I want to make it up.I want to know what you've been through I want to see it through your eyes so I fully understand the burdens you carry. I want to help you. You don't have to run away anymore. You can come back to Camp Half-Blood and we can all make a life, a proper life. One were you are loved because you are amazing and we should have never taken you for granted. please, Leo, let me in. I won't break you. I promise I won't let you down. Just open up to me. I want to understand you better and treat you right. Just come back to camp so we can help you get better. You're sick and you need medicine. We can heal you and then we can start all over. Please, Leo, forgive me. Give me a second chance. I won't let you down, I promise."

I begged Leo with every ounce I had left in me. I spoke with my heart and let my feelings come out. I told him how I felt, I spoke nothing but the truth. I just wanted him back home with me where he belonged. I wanted him back in my life. I didn't want him to keep running away from every home, carrying a heavy load of sorrow and guilt everywhere he went.

Leo stared at me for a while thinking it all through and trying to figure out wether or not to trust my words. I held my breathe as Watched him decide on wether or not he should go back to camp with us. After what seemed like forever Leo sighed. "Fine," he nodded slowly. "I'll come back with you but we have somethings to talk about. I can't keep living there if you guys cast me off to the side and treat me like the last option."

I nodded. "I know, I know, Leo, and it's totally and completely our fault and I am so, so, so sorry and I promise you nothing like this will ever happen again. I was being dumb and blind and I didn't even notice that I was ignoring you but I'm going to change I promise."

Leo nodded and sneezed. "Okay, I'll go back then."

I wrapped my arms around him in a hug and squeezed him tight. I never wanted to let go. "Thank you so much, Leo. I love you and I'm sorry."

Leo hugged me back. "I love you too, Pipes."

I unraveled myself from around him and grabbed his hand and shot him a reassuring smile. I squeezed it tight and together we walked towards Jason and back towards the camp.

I hoped he understood just how grateful I was for the second chance.


End file.
